Cash still the most common gift for graduates

Graduation-day gift giving is returning to pre-recession levels, but that doesn’t mean many graduates will be going home in a new car or toting other extravagant gifts this year.

By Neal Simpson

The Patriot Ledger, Quincy, MA

By Neal Simpson

Posted Jun. 1, 2012 at 12:01 AM
Updated Jun 1, 2012 at 1:08 AM

By Neal Simpson

Posted Jun. 1, 2012 at 12:01 AM
Updated Jun 1, 2012 at 1:08 AM

HINGHAM

» Social News

Graduation-day gift giving is returning to pre-recession levels, but that doesn’t mean many graduates will be going home in a new car or toting other extravagant gifts this year.

“I’ve got a huge college tuition next year, so no one in my house is getting a car,” said Linda Hill, a former Hingham School Committee chairwoman and the mother of a Hingham High senior. “I don’t know anybody who’s getting a car.”

A survey released by the National Retail Federation earlier this month found that Americans plan to spend more than $4.7 billion on graduation gifts, the most since at least 2007. On average, Americans plan to spend just a few cents under $100 on gifts for college and high school grads, also a five-year high.

Cash is still the most common gift for graduates, with more than 57 percent of those surveyed saying they planned to give money this year. More than a third of respondents said they’d be giving a gift card, and less than 13 percent said they planned to buy electronics, apparel or other gifts for a graduate.

“A lot of seniors are asking for money to put in their bank account for school,” said Karen Morris, a Hingham resident whose son is graduating this weekend. “It’s really hard this summer for them to find jobs.”

Many parents on the South Shore are also celebrating the milestone with a graduation party or a family trip. Hill said her son’s grandparents are chipping in to get him a laptop for school, and his dad is taking him on a trip with other Hingham High seniors.

“He needs a new laptop for school, so it’s not like I’m getting him anything special,” she said.

National retailers are also betting that parents are going to spend their gift dollars on things their graduates need to get set up in their dormitories. A number of stores – including Kohl’s, The Container Store and Bed Bath & Beyond – now offer gift registries specifically for graduates.

Rachael Risinger, a spokeswoman for Bed Bath & Beyond, said graduates who sign up for the store’s registry tend to pick out things like bedding, towels and laundry supplies, as well as gift cards for the things they find they’ve forgotten once they get to campus.

At Campus Bound, a Quincy-based college counseling service, president Gregg Cohen said he’s found that most of his high school clients are getting dorm room supplies from their parents this spring.

“It’s still mostly things around their chosen colleges,” he said.

But when South Shore graduates get to campus next fall, they could find that they fared slightly better than their classmates from other parts of the country: The survey found that graduation gift-givers in the Northeast are likely to outspend their counterparts in the rest of the country by at least $10 this year.